The socialist regime in Venezuela briefly detained opposition leader María Corina Machado amid gunshots on Thursday after she made her first public appearance in months.
Machado, who leads Venezuela’s only mainstream center-right party, Vente Venezuela, remained in hiding for months facing threats of arrest after the socialist regime issued an arrest warrant against exiled opposition presidential candidate Edmundo González, forcing him to flee to Spain in September. Over the past year, dozens of Vente Venezuela members, including key staff members of Machado’s team, have been persecuted and arbitrarily imprisoned by the Maduro regime.
Machado publicly reappeared in Caracas on Thursday afternoon to participate in one of the nationwide peaceful protests that the opposition convened to protest against socialist dictator Nicolás Maduro’s new illegitimately obtained six-year term following his “victory” in the fraudulent July 28 presidential election.
González, a 75-year-old former diplomat, was recognized by the United States and other countries as the winner of that election after the opposition presented voter tallies obtained on the day of the sham election they claim could demonstrate Maduro lost in a landslide.
Maduro was sworn in as president by Jorge Rodríguez, the head of the regime-controlled National Assembly on Friday morning. González, who also planned to be inaugurated as president on Friday, is not in Venezuela at press time. The Venezuelan opposition reportedly insisted that González will be inaugurated as president in Venezuela on Friday despite his absence, but insisted it could not “cannot give up the strategies” it would use to make that happen.
Machado asserted during remarks at Thursday’s protest that whatever the Maduro regime does from Friday onwards, “they will be buried,” and that it will mark the end of the socialist regime.
“If they commit this crime against the Constitution and the popular sovereignty, they will be sentencing their destiny. As of today we are in a new phase, we have been preparing ourselves these days and these weeks,” Machado said. “We lived a Christmas of deep reflection. Venezuela has already decided, Venezuela is free.”
Moments later, Machado’s team reported that she was violently intercepted as she left the gathering and that Maduro regime officials fired at the motorcycle that was transporting her. Machado was abducted and her whereabouts remained unknown at the time.
The international community and several heads of state immediately condemned the events. Several governments such as those of Argentina, Panama, and Chile released official statements calling for Machado’s immediate release. President-elect Donald Trump warned the Maduro regime, demanding that both Machado stays safe and alive.
Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele appeared to refer to the events in Venezuela — first, by posting a picture of Caracas’ weather forecast, and then by posting a picture of a blue purse in reference to the “blue purse” Machado said in the video published by the Maduro regime.
“Venezuelan democracy activist Maria Corina Machado and President-elect Gonzalez are peacefully expressing the voices and the WILL of the Venezuelan people with hundreds of thousands of people demonstrating against the regime,” President-elect Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“The great Venezuelan American community in the United States overwhelmingly support a free Venezuela, and strongly supported me. These freedom fighters should not be harmed, and MUST stay SAFE and ALIVE!” he continued.
Amid the commotion, Venezuelan state media and Maduro regime-affiliated accounts on both social media and messaging platforms spread a video of Machado appearing in an undisclosed open space, where she asserted that she was “safe.” Many observers doubted the authenticity of the video due to the fact that it was first published by regime affiliates.
“I am fine, I am safe. Today, January 9, we left the wonderful rally. I was chased, I dropped my purse, the blue purse that belongs to me fell in the street and now I am fine, safe and Venezuela will be free,” Machado is heard saying.
Magali Meda, a wanted Venezuelan dissident sheltering in the Argentine embassy in Caracas since March, denounced the regime, explaining through social media that Machado had been knocked off the motorcycle, forcefully taken away, and forced to record “several videos” before being released.
Hours later, Machado posted on Twitter that she was now located “in a safe place” and that she would disclose what happened on Thursday on Friday. Machado has not issued new public statements at press time.
Several Maduro regime officials denied involvement in the incidents. Interior Minister and suspected drug lord Diosdado Cabello claimed during a regime rally that it was all “an invention, a lie,” and that Machado is “dying for us to capture her.”
“They wanted to alarm all Venezuela and in the end they end up with the ridiculousness of ridiculousness, lying, saying that the government had captured María Corina,” Cabello said.
Venezuelan Attorney General Tarek William Saab also dismissed Machado’s brief abduction, claiming that it was part of a “psychological operation” that sought to “unleash violence” in Venezuela before Maduro is sworn in on Friday.
Saab claimed that Thursday’s events could be considered a “simulation of a punishable event,” where it was “falsely” reported that Machado “had been intercepted and detained.”
“This lady is a recidivist in this type of theater that seeks to victimize her when her macabre intentions fail,” Saab said in an official statement. “Her exacerbated social narcissism to attract attention is indicative of suffering from Borderline or Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD).”
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
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